Not Your Standard Day Trip Ideas from Omaha and 3 Hours in any Direction: How to plan your day trip

 

This post has been a long time coming. As an avid day tripper, I'm always on the hunt for fresh day-trip ideas. This has led to countless internet searches over the years, and it's no surprise that there are plenty of blog posts (mainly) and articles (less so) with day trip ideas for Nebraska. What is lacking is real variety and more options. Every time I click on a new search find, I'm hoping that this post/article might, just *might*, give me ideas for something that:

 a) I haven't done before 

b) aren't just the same ideas churned out in the hundreds of posts/articles I've read before

c) take me to more than one place (i.e., an actual day trip)

d) be a place where no money or very little is required

Look, no offense, but driving 20 minutes west of Omaha to a tiny town that happens to have a candy maker where you visit, buy candy, and return home isn't my idea of a day trip. It does sound interesting, but more within the context of a larger day trip. 

So, after reading yet another "Day Trip Ideas Close to Omaha" that utterly frustrated me, I decided it was time to make my own post. A post that gives you real, concrete, full-day adventure ideas for day trips. As I started thinking about this, I realized that I needed to make this a multi-post series. There's just too much to cover in one. Today's topic, then, is how to plan and prepare for the perfect day trip.

When planning a day trip, what you're looking for is a fun day of adventure. Why take a day trip? You can't always hop on a plane to far locales whenever the nerve hits you, right? Sometimes you just need to do something on an otherwise boring weekend day. Or maybe, you're looking for some adventure on a budget, and that only takes the better part of one day.

How I plan my day trips follows a formula:

• I want to check out two to four points of interest. How many I visit will depend on how long each visit takes. Is it just a sculpture outside or a full museum? 

• I want to visit at least one outdoor area where I can take a hike or a walk. Preferably somewhere that's aesthetically pleasing, i.e., not a cement sidewalk in an open field. During the colder months, I simply substitute another point of interest for the hike/walk.

• Picnics are essential! They save money and are a lot of fun. (My kids still swear to this day that nothing tastes better than a picnic sandwich. I agree, as there's something about eating your meal in the fresh air.) Therefore, I want to find a place to stop for a picnic. This could be a city park or a picnic table at the hiking/walking area I've chosen. Which one I pick depends on the day's schedule. When my kids were little, I'd try to find a picnic area with a play area, too. This helped burn off energy and break up the monotony of a car ride.

• Last, but not least, I want to end the day at a place or two where I can have a glass of wine and/or a cold beverage. Local wine and beer makers are a part of a state's identity, heritage, and economy.

Once I've figured out where I want to go, I need to do research:

* I pull up my town on a Google Map and expand outward. 

* I take a look in all directions around my city and see what towns lie in that area.

* I then zoom in closer on each town and see if anything shows up in each town. Whether I see anything or not, I will do a search on things to do in that town and jot it down. 


* I look for points of interest in between or near these towns, and jot those down.

* After researching all the points of interest - museums, art galleries, old cemeteries, sculpture gardens, famous person birthplaces, wineries, etc. - I then check their operating hours for the day of the week I will be visiting.


* I will look for an outdoor area (during nicer weather) that I can both walk/hike at and eat a picnic lunch at.

Now all that's left to do is build my itinerary, pack a picnic lunch and other supplies I need, then hit the road. 

And that's how I plan a proper day trip. I'll be posting regularly-ish with interesting day trips you can take in and around the Omaha area. These are all trips I have done and I will include pictures and links (where applicable) to posts I've previously made about that specific day trip.

Until then, have a great weekend. And, if you want, plan a day trip for tomorrow or Sunday.

Happy Traveling!